


The Smell of Something Fishy

by pt_tucker



Series: A Little TLC (Tender Loving Cats) [3]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Cat/Human Hybrids, Catboy!Sherlock, Catboys & Catgirls, Dog/Human Hybrids, Dogboy!John, Dogboys & Doggirls, Foxboys & Foxgirls, Implied/Referenced Incest, John's POV, M/M, Scenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-26
Updated: 2015-11-26
Packaged: 2018-05-03 11:04:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5288327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pt_tucker/pseuds/pt_tucker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“You smell like Mycroft,” John said carefully, wondering how one went about broaching the subject of their flatmate smelling like they’d just finished a week-long sex holiday with their brother.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Smell of Something Fishy

**Author's Note:**

  * For [yeaka](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yeaka/gifts).



> Another from John's POV! Once again unbeta'd so forgive me for the mistakes! If you see any, feel free to let me know!

John nodded hello at Greg as the Detective Inspector held the police tape up for him. 

“Look who’s finally decided to return to us,” Greg said, smiling. “Where’s the sidekick?” He glanced up and down the street, as if he expected Sherlock to pop out of one of the bins that lined the alley. Knowing Sherlock, he just might.

“Fairly certain I’m actually the sidekick, but I suppose I’ll made do with my new role.” John’s gaze swept the alley alongside Greg’s. Their errant consulting detective didn’t materialize out of any dirty puddles, however. “Sherlock’s on his way. Texted me to meet him.” 

Greg dropped the tape. “Between you and me, I wouldn’t exactly be heartbroken if he happened to _forget_ to meet us.”

John winced. He could only imagine the trouble Sherlock had gotten up to while he’d been gone. Dimmick had given him a terrified look that spoke of nightmares - many, many nightmares - when John had told him he was going to be away for a week visiting his family. “Unfortunately, I don’t think I’d be as much use as him.”

“Unfortunately.” Greg sighed. “Well, at least now that you’re here, he should calm down a bit. I’d almost managed to forget how awful he was before you came along.” He gave John a smile that was equal parts fondness and hair-pulling exasperation.

“Thanks, I think.” John’s brows drew together as he thought about it, before the expression cleared away moments later. “Well, no point in waiting around out here. What have we got?” 

Greg gave the street one last scan before motioning to John to follow him into the house. He led him past several rooms, all of them filled with frenzied forensics officers, who were no doubt doing their best to solve it before they had to deal with Sherlock. John caught sight of Anderson in one of the rooms, who let out a heavy sigh as they strode past. 

John crinkled his nose once they reached the room with the body: it’d obviously been here a few days. Greg held out a handkerchief, but John shook his head and pulled out his own. It was made of heavy-duty scent guard material and did a good job of blocking out the poor lad’s posthumous odor. Not that Greg’s own handkerchief was shabby. As a fox, his sense of smell was on par with John’s, so it wasn’t surprising how much he relaxed once it was pressed up against his sensitive nose. Together they squatted down next to what was once a twenty-ish male bird with bright white wings.

“Swan?” John asked, carefully stretching the left one so that he could better examine the blood spattered on the feathers. 

Greg shook his head. “Dove. Thank goodness.” 

“Native?” John let the wing fall back down and cover the rest of the bird’s body. They’d have to flip him over eventually, but that could wait until Sherlock showed up. The detective throwing a fit over a disturbed crime scene wasn’t exactly one of John’s favorite sights. 

“American,” Sherlock said, striding into the room then as if called by John’s thoughts. His tail curled around John’s shoulders in a brief hello before falling away to swish behind his legs. The long blond hair on John’s own tail flowed against the floor as it swept back and forth. 

Sherlock’s eyes darted across the expanse of the bird’s back before he turned towards the window set into the nearest wall. “You said a neighbor looked in and saw him? From that window?” Sherlock pointed at it, as if Greg wouldn’t know which one he was talking about when there was only one window in the room.

“Yeah, a Mrs. Norshy.” Greg stood and pulled out a pocket-sized notepad from his jacket. “Said she caught sight of him around 6 AM when she received no response to the doorbell. Called it in right away.” Greg motioned towards the bird. “Do you want us to flip him over for you?”

“Unnecessary. It’s obvious what happened here,” Sherlock said, his eyes glued to the floor as he walked around the room.

“Yeah?” Greg nodded towards Sherlock silently, and John took that as his que.

“What happened here?” John asked, turning to watch Sherlock prowl about the room.

“The body wasn’t originally in this spot,” Sherlock started, his lips curling up into a smile that made John’s tail wag again. His ears perked up into upside-down triangles as he focused on the detective.

Sally chose that minute to walk into the room. She had a bunch of photographs in her right hand. “Looks like we won’t be needing you after all, Freak.” Her eyes widened as she sucked in a deep breath through her nose, and she stared at Sherlock as if he’d just declared that he ate small children for breakfast. “Have you found yourself a girlfriend?” The tone in her voice changed the question to something more along the lines of “Who have you kidnapped and where are you hiding her?”

Sherlock hissed at her and snatched the photographs away without answering. Sally was too shocked to hiss back. Her own black cat-tail swished curiously as she leaned in to sniff him. Sherlock scooted towards John, his face growing more and more annoyed as flipped through the photographs. 

John glanced at Greg, who shrugged, and they both dropped their handkerchiefs at the same time. The smell of the body hit John first, and that was almost enough to have him vowing never to eat again as his stomach gave a twirl, but it was soon accompanied by the smell of not two, but _three_ cats. Over the top of Sherlock’s familiar scent was another, which was, worryingly, also familiar. 

“Damnit,” Sherlock snapped. He thrust the photos back towards a startled Sally. Dropping his hands into his pockets, he whirled towards John, “Clearly this was a waste of time. Not that it was a very interesting case to begin with, barely a four.” He threw that last bit in Greg’s general direction. Greg didn’t pay him any mind as he too sniffed Sherlock. 

“Oh, would you all stop being such children.” 

Sherlock’s words might have had more of an impact if he hadn’t then flounced out of the room. They all recognized the start of a tantrum for when they saw it. 

“Is that…” Greg trailed off.

“Yeah,” John answered. He’d recognize that smell anywhere. It was only covering their entire flat every other week. 

Greg’s brow creased while Sally’s gaze darted between them. 

“I’ll talk to him,” John continued, “but it’s probably just them being...them.” He gave Greg a friendly pat on the shoulder and made for the door, though he couldn’t help but pause and peak at the photos in Sally’s hands. 

She held them up so he could see the first one better. “Found these in Mrs. Norshy’s house. Apparently she’s something of a voyeur.”

“Right,” John said. And then, mostly to himself, he repeated, “Right,” because sometimes people were just too much for his comprehension. Especially people who took pictures of their husband murdering their neighbor and kept them around for the police to find.

Darting out of the house, he was just in time to see Sherlock slide into a cab. Sherlock must have told the driver to wait since John was actually able to climb in behind him without having to chase the car down the road. The bastard had probably forgotten his wallet and needed John to pay.

They rode in silence for a few minutes before John turned to look at his cab-mate. 

Sherlock sighed, and didn’t turn from watching the people they passed on the sidewalk. “Ask.” 

“You smell like Mycroft,” John said carefully, wondering how one went about broaching the subject of their flatmate smelling like they’d just finished a week-long sex holiday with their brother. John studied Sherlock as he spoke, but the cat didn’t react beyond letting out another deep sigh.

“Yes.”

John looked out his own window. He stared at each building they passed as long as their travel would allow before another building took its place. He turned back to Sherlock after the seventeenth.

“Are you going to tell me why or should I make a deduction?”

That got Sherlock’s attention. He shifted in his seat so that he could properly pin John underneath his gaze. He probably thought it was very intimidating, but it really just made John want to give into the subtext and chin him. “As amusing as that might be, unless I wish to spend the next several weeks stuck in this cab, I’m afraid I don’t have the time that it would take to correct all of your completely inaccurate assumptions, so I might as well save us both the trouble and let you know that I stayed with Mycroft while you were away.”

“You stayed with Mycroft?” John said, ignoring everything else since that was really the only way one could stand interacting with Sherlock Holmes on a regular basis.

“Yes, that’s what I just said.” He made it sound like it was John’s fault that he hadn’t realized they were now apparently the best of mates.

“ _You_ stayed with _Mycroft_. You, who on any other day couldn’t be paid enough to socialize with people you actually like, let alone your brother, who last month you called during dinner just to see if he’d died from overeating and was disappointed when he said no.”

Sherlock smiled, and John didn’t need almost-superhuman deductive abilities to know he was recalling that particular conversation. Dropping the amusement, Sherlock answered, “He offered me a mildly interesting case while Scotland Yard was being particularly boring, and we ended up working closely together until the matter was solved. Seeing how you weren’t home anyway, I decided it best to simply stay there while I investigated.”

“Which resulted in his scent covering you to the point that anyone passing by would think he’s laid a claim. A _sexual_ claim,” he added, in case Sherlock wanted to play the naïve virgin unable to comprehend Sex Ed 101.

Sherlock stared at him, his tail swishing lazily between them as he focused on something inside John that only he could see. “And if he has?” 

John’s mouth dropped open and he had no time to compose himself before they were pulling up to Baker Street. Sherlock hopped out of the cab without a backwards glance, and John was left to pull out his wallet. Again. 

Mentally cursing, John tossed a couple of bills at the cabbie, the total of which equaled far more than what the ride had been worth. Hopefully the extra would entice him not to go screaming to the press the instant he drove away. Not that Mycroft couldn’t disappear him if the driver looked ready to blow the lid on the Holmes brothers’ completely-misunderstood-probably-not-at-all-what-it-John-was-thinking relationship, but it was in everyone’s best interests not to give Mycroft excuses to disappear people.

Darting up the stairs, he found Sherlock in the kitchen examining what looked like the same experiment that had been sitting on the table when John had left. He pressed down on his comment about _that_ and focused on what was really important. Like finding out if Sherlock was fucking his brother.

“Why would Mycroft lay a claim on you?” John asked, because he refused to think it was the obvious without further proof.

“Why does anyone?” Sherlock picked up a petri dish that held what was once maybe a banana – may it rest in peace – and brought it to eye-level for closer examination. John’s only blessing was that he’d convinced the cat to use scent-blocker while he’d been away and unable to clean up his flatmate’s messes, and so it didn’t smell as awful as it looked. 

“To let people know you’re together.” And to let people know that he _belonged_ to Mycroft, judging by the overpowering pheromones drifting off Sherlock in waves.

“No.” Sherlock put the once-might-have-been-a-banana back on the table. “To let people know you’re _taken_.”

“Is there a difference?”

“The difference is that the case we worked together was extremely delicate. Even the slightest set-back could have undermined all of our plans. One of the people I was tasked to work with while undercover developed an interest in me. Since I couldn’t say no to her without risking losing her future help, Mycroft decided the best course of action was to make it known I wasn’t available.” Sherlock said it as if such a thing _wouldn’t_ have been considered improper in theory, let alone in practice to the point of Mycroft’s stench warding off potential suitors for miles.

“And it couldn’t have been anyone else? I mean, you do know that smelling like your brother in _that_ way is a bit not good, right? You do know that?” John could never be certain with Sherlock.

“Why is it ‘a bit not good’?” The cat’s ears were back and his tail flicked angrily behind him. 

John backed up and allowed his own tail to droop as he took a more submissive stance. Sherlock’s anger visibly dialed down, though it was far from dissipated. It was enough for John to have a chance to say his peace though, and that was good enough for him. 

“It’s just…” John floundered for a way to explain this to a man who apparently didn’t think his big brother _licking his naked body_ was at all strange. “It’s just not done.”

“Many things I do ‘just aren’t done.’ You’ve never minded before; why does this make you so upset? It allowed us to complete our task and has the additional benefits of keeping away the insistent imbeciles who are ‘willing to brave my awful personality’ in order to benefit from my physical attractiveness.” 

“Yes, but…” John looked around. He caught sight of a bloody knife resting in someone’s severed hand and decided to switch tactics. “Don’t you think Mycroft went a little overkill with his scent? You smell like he kept you chained to a bed all week.” 

Sherlock’s lips quirked. “Mycroft never does anything half-way.” There was something in his tone that John could probably have pinpointed if he hadn’t been terrified of actually pinpointing it. 

He shook his head and grabbed one of the (hopefully) unused rags out of the cupboard. The mess was going to take a while to clean up, and he knew that only half their number would be doing any of said cleaning. 

“How did he make his claim?” John asked after a few minutes of silence, in which he attempted to clear the kitchen table of questionable substances while Sherlock simultaneously tried to save said questionable substances by moving them to a different part of the table. It was equal parts amusing and infuriating.

Sherlock didn’t answer right away. 

John glanced over from the bluish lump of… _something_ he was trying to scrub into submission to find the detective fiddling with an empty syringe. “Sherlock?”

“Let’s just say he was very…” Sherlock’s brows drew together as he tried to find the right word. “…thorough. And motivated.” Setting the syringe down, he went to their menu drawer and pulled out the piece of paper sitting on the top. “Mongolian?” Sherlock held the menu up questioningly with one hand while he pulled out his mobile with the other.

“Sure,” John said, his own brows furrowing. 

People’s scents naturally rubbed off on each other when they were together enough – John smelled like Sherlock and Sherlock _had_ smelled like John – but it usually required some sort of fluid exchange for someone to carry around the amount of “Mycroft” that Sherlock had plastered all over him. That’s what _made_ it a sexual claim in the first place. John shuddered the mental image of Mycroft pissing on Sherlock. Surely they weren’t _that_ strange? 

Sherlock pulled the knife out of the severed hand and proceeded to slowly stab it over and over again as he waited for whoever was on the other end of the line to pick up the call. 

…John resolved not to think about it anymore. Plausible deniability and all that ruckus. Even if he was just denying it to himself.

**Author's Note:**

> So, what'd you think? These things are certainly getting longer! Hopefully it wasn't drawn-out and boring. ^^;


End file.
